A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries. In the United Kingdom, grammar schools provide secondary education, similar to high school in the US. In the modern United States (US), the term is synonymous with elementary school.

The original purpose of medieval grammar schools was the teaching of Latin. Over time the curriculum was broadened, first to include Ancient Greek and sometimes Hebrew, and later English and European languages, as well as the natural sciences, mathematics, history, geography and other subjects. In the late Victorian era, grammar schools were reorganised to provide secondary education across the United Kingdom with the exception of Scotland, which had developed its own system. Grammar schools of these types were also established in various British territories, where they have evolved in different ways.

Grammar schools became the selective tier of the Tripartite System of state-funded secondary education, which existed in England and Wales from the mid-1940s to the late 1960s. It still exists in Northern Ireland. With the move to comprehensive schools in the 1960s and 1970s, some grammar schools became fully independent and charged fees, while most others were abolished or became comprehensive. Many schools of both types still include "grammar school" in their names. Some parts of England retain forms of the Tripartite System, and there are also a few surviving grammar schools in otherwise comprehensive areas. Some of the remaining grammar schools can trace their history back to earlier than the 16th century.

From medieval times, a grammar school was a school for the teaching of Latin (and later other classical languages).

Although the term scolae grammaticales did not enter common usage until the 14th century, the earliest schools of this type appeared from the 6th century, e.g. the King's School, Canterbury (founded 597) and the King's School, Rochester (604).^[1][2] They were attached to cathedrals and monasteries, and taught Latin (the language of the church) to future priests and monks. Other subjects required for religious work were occasionally added, including music and verse (for liturgy), astronomy and mathematics (for the church calendar) and law (for administration).^[3]

With the foundation of the ancient universities from the late 12th century, grammar schools became the entry point to an education in the liberal arts, with Latin seen as the foundation of the trivium. Pupils were usually educated in grammar schools up to the age of 14, after which they would look to universities and the church for further study. The first schools independent of the church, Winchester College (1382) and Eton College (1440), were closely tied to the universities, and as boarding schools became national in character.^[3][4]

During the English Reformation in the 16th century, many cathedral schools were closed and replaced by new foundations using the proceeds of the dissolution of the monasteries.^[3] For example, the oldest extant schools in Wales, Christ College, Brecon (founded 1541) and the Friars School, Bangor (1557), were founded on the sites of former Dominican monasteries. Chesterfield Grammar School (renamed Brookfield Community School in 1991) was founded in 1594 during the reign of Elizabeth I.

Edward VI also made an important contribution to grammar schools, founding a series of schools during his reign (see King Edward's School). James I founded a series of "Royal Schools" in Ulster, beginning with the Royal School, Armagh. In theory these schools were open to all and offered free tuition to those who could not afford to pay fees. However, the vast majority of poor children did not attend these schools since their labour was economically valuable to their families.

In the Scottish Reformation, schools such as the Choir School of Glasgow Cathedral (founded 1124) and the Grammar School of the Church of Edinburgh (1128) passed from the control of the church to burgh councils, and the burghs also founded new schools.

With the increased emphasis on studying the scriptures after the Reformation, many schools added Greek and few Hebrew. The teaching of these languages was hampered by a shortage of non-Latin type and of teachers fluent in the languages.

During the 16th and 17th centuries, the setting up of grammar schools became a common act of charity by the nobility, wealthy merchants or corporate bodies such as guilds. Many of these are still commemorated in annual "Founder's Day" services and ceremonies at surviving schools. The usual pattern was to create an endowment to pay the wages of a master to instruct local boys in Latin, and sometimes Greek, without charge.^[5]

Teaching usually took place from dawn to dusk, and focused heavily upon the rote learning of Latin. In order to encourage fluency, some schoolmasters recommended punishing any pupil who spoke in English. It would be several years before pupils were able to construct a sentence, and they would be in their final years at the school when they began translating passages. By the end of their studies, they would be quite familiar with the great Latin authors, as well as the studies of drama and rhetoric.^[6] Other skills, such as numeracy and handwriting, were neglected, being taught in odd moments or by travelling specialist teachers such as scriveners.

In 1755, Samuel Johnson's Dictionary defined a grammar school as "a school in which the learned languages are grammatically taught".^[7] However by this time demand for these languages had fallen greatly. A new commercial class required modern languages and commercial subjects.^[5] Most grammar schools set up in the 18th century also taught arithmetic and English.^[8] In Scotland, the burgh councils were able to update the curricula of existing schools. As a result, Scotland no longer has grammar schools in any of the senses discussed here, though some, such as Aberdeen Grammar School, retain the name.^[9]

In England, pressure from the urban middle class for a commercial curriculum was often supported by the school's trustees (who would charge the new students fees) but resisted by the schoolmaster, supported by the terms of the original endowment. A few schools managed to obtain special Acts of Parliament to change their statutes, such as the Macclesfield Grammar School Act 1774 and the Bolton Grammar School Act 1788, but most could not.^[5] Such a dispute between the trustees and master of Leeds Grammar School led to a celebrated case in the Court of Chancery. After 10 years, Lord Eldon, then Lord Chancellor, ruled in 1805, "There is no authority for thus changing the nature of the Charity, and filling a School intended for the purpose of teaching Greek and Latin with Scholars learning the German and French languages, mathematics, and anything except Greek and Latin."^[10] Although Lord Eldon offered a compromise by which some subjects might be added to a classical core, the ruling set a restrictive precedent for grammar schools across England. Grammar schools seemed to be in terminal decline.^[3][8]

The 19th century saw a series of reforms to grammar schools, culminating in the Endowed Schools Act. Grammar schools were re-invented as academically oriented secondary schools following literary or scientific curricula, while often retaining classical subjects.

The Grammar Schools Act 1840 made it lawful to apply the income of grammar schools to purposes other than the teaching of classical languages, but change still required the consent of the schoolmaster. Meanwhile, the national schools were re-organizing themselves along the lines of Thomas Arnold's reforms at Rugby School, and the spread of the railways lead to a new breed of boarding schools teaching a broader curriculum, such as Marlborough College (1843). The first girls' schools targeted at university entrance were North London Collegiate School (1850) and Cheltenham Ladies' College (from the appointment of Dorothea Beale in 1858).^[5][8]

Modelled on the Clarendon Commission, which led to the Public Schools Act 1868, restructuring the trusts of nine leading schools, the Taunton Commission was appointed to examine the 782 remaining endowed grammar schools. The Commission reported that the distribution of schools did not match the current population, and that provision was greatly varied in quality. Provision for girls was particularly limited.^[5][8]

The Commission proposed the creation of a national system of secondary education by restructuring the endowments of these schools for modern purposes. The result was the Endowed Schools Act 1869, which created the Endowed Schools Commission with extensive powers over endowments of individual schools. It was said that the Commission "could turn a boys' school in Northumberland into a girls' school in Cornwall". Across England and Wales, schools endowed to offer free classical instruction to boys were remodelled as fee-paying schools (with a few competitive scholarships) teaching broad curricula to boys or girls.^[5][8][11]

Many new schools were created with modern curricula, though often retaining a classical core. At the time, there was a great emphasis on the importance of self-improvement, and parents keen for their children to receive a decent education took a lead in organising the creation of new schools. These newer schools tended to emulate the great public schools, copying their curriculum, ethos and ambitions, and often took the title "grammar school" for historical reasons.

Grammar schools thus emerged as one part of the highly varied education system of England and Wales before 1944. Under the Education (Administrative Provisions) Act 1907, all grant-aided secondary schools were required to provide at least 25% of their places as free scholarships for students from public elementary schools.^[3][8]

The 1944 Butler Education Act created the first nationwide system of state-funded secondary education in England and Wales, echoed by the Education (Northern Ireland) Act 1947. One of the three types of school forming the Tripartite System was called the grammar school, seeking to spread the academic ethos of the existing grammar schools. Grammar schools were intended to teach an academic curriculum to the most intellectually able 25% of the school population, selected by the eleven plus examination.

Two types of grammar school existed under the system:^[12]

• There were over 2000 "maintained" schools, which were fully state-funded. Though some were quite old, most were either newly created or built since the Victorian period, seeking to replicate the studious, aspirational atmosphere found in the older grammar schools.
• There were also 179 direct grant grammar schools, which took between one quarter and one half of their pupils from the state system, and the rest from fee-paying parents. They also exercised far greater freedom from local authorities, and were members of the Headmasters' Conference. These schools included some very old schools, encouraged to partake in the Tripartite System. They achieved the best academic results of any state schools. The most famous example of a direct grant grammar was Manchester Grammar School, whose headmaster, Lord James of Rusholme, was one of the most outspoken advocates of the Tripartite System.

Grammar school pupils were given the best opportunities of any schoolchildren. Initially they studied for the School Certificate and Higher School Certificate, replaced in 1951 by General Certificate of Education examinations at O-level (Ordinary level) and A-level (Advanced level). In contrast, very few students at secondary modern schools took public examinations until the introduction of the less academic Certificate of Secondary Education (known as the CSE) in the 1960s.^[13] Until the implementation of the Robbins Report in the 1960s, children from public and grammar schools effectively monopolised access to university. These schools were also the only ones that offered an extra term of school to prepare pupils for the competitive entrance exams for Oxbridge.

The Tripartite System was largely abolished in England and Wales between 1965, with the issue of Circular 10/65, and the 1976 Education Act. Most grammar schools were amalgamated with a number of other local schools, to form neighbourhood comprehensive schools, though a few were closed. This process proceeded quickly in Wales, with the closure of such schools as Cowbridge Grammar School. In England, implementation was more uneven, with some counties and individual schools resisting the change.^[14][15]

Direct grant grammar schools almost invariably severed their ties with the state sector, and became fully independent. There are thus many schools with the name "grammar", but which are not free. These schools normally select their pupils by an entrance examination, and sometimes an interview.

By the end of the 1980s, all of the grammar schools in Wales and most of those in England had closed or become comprehensive. (Selection also disappeared from state-funded schools in Scotland in the same period.) While many former grammar schools ceased to be selective, some of them retained the word "grammar" in their name. Most of these schools remain comprehensive, while a few became partially selective or fully selective in the 1990s.

Today, "grammar school" commonly refers to one of the remaining fully selective state-funded schools in England and Northern Ireland.

At the 1995 Labour Party conference, David Blunkett, then education spokesman, promised that there would be no selection under a Labour government. However the party's manifesto for the 1997 election promised that "Any changes in the admissions policies of grammar schools will be decided by local parents."^[16] Under the Labour government's School Standards and Framework Act 1998, grammar schools were for the first time to be designated by statutory instrument.^[17][18] The Act also defined a procedure by which local communities could petition for a ballot for an end to selection at schools.^[19][20] Petitions were launched in several areas, but only one received the signatures of 20% of eligible parents, the level needed to trigger a ballot.^[21] Thus the only ballot held to date was for Ripon Grammar School in 2000, when parents rejected change by a ratio of 2 to 1.^[22] These arrangements were condemned by the Select Committee for Education and Skills as being ineffective and a waste of time and resources.^[23]

There are still 164 state-run grammar schools in existence.^[24] Only a few areas keep a formal grammar school system along the lines of the Tripartite System. In these areas, the eleven plus exam is used solely to identify a subset of children (around 25%) considered suitable for grammar education. When a grammar school has too many qualified applicants, other criteria are used to allocate places, such as siblings, distance or faith. Such systems still exist in Buckinghamshire, Rugby and Stratford districts of Warwickshire, the Salisbury district of Wiltshire, Stroud in Gloucestershire and most of Lincolnshire, Kent and Medway. Of metropolitan areas, Trafford and most of Wirral are selective.^[25][26]

In other areas, grammar schools survive mainly as very highly selective schools in an otherwise comprehensive county, for example in several of the outer boroughs of London. In some LEAs, as few as 2% of 11 year olds may attend grammar schools. These schools are often heavily over-subscribed, and award places in rank order of performance in their entry tests. They also tend to dominate the top positions in performance tables.^[27]

No further radical change is proposed by either of the main political parties. Although many on the left argue that the existence of selective schools undermines the comprehensive structure, the Labour government has delegated decisions on grammar schools to local processes, which have not yet resulted in any changes. Moreover government education policy appears to accept the existence of some kind of hierarchy in secondary education, with specialist schools, advanced schools, beacon schools and similar initiatives proposed as ways of raising standards. Many grammar schools have featured in these programmes, and a lower level of selection is permitted at specialist schools.^[28][29] Though many in the Conservative Party favour the expansion of grammar schools, since 2006 the Party's policy has been that no new grammar schools will be built, except to cope with population expansion in wholly selective areas such as Buckinghamshire. David Willetts, shadow education secretary, argued that because middle-class parents now invest so much in preparing their children for the tests, grammar schools no longer offer opportunities to gifted children from poorer backgrounds.^[30]

Attempts to move to a comprehensive system (as in the rest of the United Kingdom) have been delayed by shifts in the administration of the province. As a result, Northern Ireland still maintains the grammar school system with most pupils being entered for the Eleven Plus. Since the "open enrolment" reform of 1989, these schools (unlike those in England) have been required to accept pupils up to their capacity, which has also increased.^[31] By 2006, the 69 grammar schools took 42% of transferring children, and only 7 of them took all of their intake from the top 30% of the cohort.^[32]

The 11-plus has long been controversial, and the province's political parties have taken opposing positions. Unionists tend to lean towards preserving the grammar schools as they are, with academic selection at the age of 11, whereas republicans lean towards scrapping the Eleven Plus. The Democratic Unionist Party claimed to have ensured the continuation of the grammar school system in the Province as part of the St Andrews Agreement in October 2006. By contrast Sinn Féin claims to have secured the abolition of the 11+ and a veto over any system which might follow it.

The last 11-plus exam will be held in 2008 (for 2009 entry). A proposed new transfer point at age 14, with specialisation of schools beyond that point, may offer a future role for grammar schools.^[33] However, a consortium of 25 grammar schools intend to run a common entry test for 2009 admissions, and Lumen Christi College, the top-ranking Catholic school, also plans to run its own tests.^[34][35]

Grammar schools were established in various British territories, and have developed in different ways since those territories became independent.

In the mid-19th century, private schools were established in the Australian colonies to spare the wealthy classes from sending their sons to schools in Britain. These schools took their inspiration from English public schools, and often called themselves "grammar schools".^[36] Early examples include Launceston Church Grammar School (1846), Pulteney Grammar School (1847) and Geelong Grammar School (1855). With the exception of the non-denominational Sydney Grammar School (1857) and Queensland grammar schools, all the grammar schools established in the 19th century were attached to the Church of England (now the Anglican Church of Australia). In Queensland, the Grammar Schools Act 1860 provided for the state-assisted foundation of non-denominational grammar schools. Ten were founded, of which 8 still exist.^[37] The first Australian grammar school for girls was Brisbane Girls' Grammar School (1875); others soon followed.^[38]

In the 1920s grammar schools of other denominations were established, including members of the Associated Grammar Schools of Victoria, and the trend has continued to the present day. Today, the term is defined only in Queensland legislation. Throughout the country, "grammar schools" are generally high-cost private schools. The equivalent of contemporary English grammar schools are selective schools.

In Ontario, until 1870, a grammar school referred to a secondary school.

In Hong Kong, grammar schools are secondary schools primarily offering a traditional curriculum (rather than vocational subjects).

Education in the Republic of Ireland, has been mainly organised on denominational lines. Grammar schools along the lines of those in Great Britain were set up for members of the Church of Ireland prior to its disestablishment in 1871. Some schools remain, as private schools catering largely for Protestant students. These are often fee-paying and accommodate boarders, given the scattered nature of the Protestant population in much of Ireland. Such schools include those in Bandon^[39], Drogheda (run by Quakers since 1956^[40]), Dundalk^[41] and Sligo^[42]. Others are among the many former fee-paying schools which have been absorbed into larger state-funded Community Schools, Community Colleges, and Comprehensive Schools, founded since the introduction of universal secondary education in the Republic by minister Donagh O'Malley in September 1967. Examples include Cork Grammar School, replaced by Ashton Comprehensive School.^[43]

Grammar schools on the British model were founded during the colonial period, beginning with the Boston Latin School, founded as the Latin Grammar School in 1635.^[44][45] In 1647 the Massachusetts Bay Colony enacted the Old Deluder Satan Law, requiring any township of at least 100 households to establish a grammar school, and similar laws followed in the other New England colonies. These schools initially taught young men the classical languages as a preparation for university, but by the mid-18th century many had broadened their curricula to include practical subjects. Nevertheless, they declined in popularity due to competition from the more practical academies.^[46]

In the modern United States, "grammar school" is a synonym for elementary school,^[47] although the use of the term is significantly in decline.

• Gymnasium (school)
• Latin school
• History of education in England

• A general timeline of British education
• Links on Elizabethan education
• The situation of grammar schools today
• National Grammar Schools Association
• Support Kent Schools
• An article on advanced schools and other advanced sections of the English secondary system.
• Commentary by The Guardian about grammar schools today
• say NO to selection!
• Campaign for Fair Admissions